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I have 4 case fans. Which do I want as intakes, and which as exhausts?

N

Noriaki

Lifer
One fan is down in front, underneath the hard drives in the usual place.

One fan is beside the ATX I/O ports sort of behind the CPU and above the AGP slot. Also a fairly usual place.

I have a fan in my power supply, and this fan is fairly powerful becuase it's a 450watt psu, it's also exhaust and I don't think I want to change that, would probably put a lot of heat into my case.

The last one is above the power supply. Like if you look at the back of the case at the top there is a fan, then the PSU fan, then below it the normal one (it's a 24" tall case).


So how should I arrange these fans to blow in and out of my case?
Like I said the PSU is Exhaust, but what about the ones above and below it? And the one in the front?
 
I would have the ones in front blowing IN and the ones in back blowing OUT.

If this is not what you want, then consider the fact that heat rises and therefore top fans should blow out.
 
Front fans bringing air into the case, and rear fans exhausting air out of the case. Constant air flow is more important than volume of air flow.
 
Your fan in the front of your case should always be intaking air just as Wingznut said. Rear fans generally exhaust, don't switch your power supply fan.

If you want a more balanced approach, then just switch the fan which blows over the PCI slots to blow in. Another possible solution would be to put a 120mm fan underneath your hard drives (if your case can accept it, some can) which pulls in as much air as the other 3 will exhaust, or somewhere close. I hope one of these 2 solutions will solve your problem. Either way, you don't want too much being brought INTO the case if you cannot exhaust it. Having too much exhaust shouldn't be a problem at all.

divinemartyr
 
hmm ok maybe I'll just leave it at my current 1 intake and 2 exhaust then...(I haven't actually added the 3rd fan in the back...I was going to...but maybe I'll just leave it...)

Do you know if an InWin Q500N can accept a 120mm fan in the front?

I know it's about 8" wide...which is about 200mm so it's white enough...but I don't know if hast he mounting holes...
 
If it doesn't have a tray or drawer for the fan then you may be left with a home mounting job to do. Just about any case can be modded to accept it, I just meant that some cases come pre-configured for this. Make sure the front of your case has some decent holes for intaking as well. Good luck.

divinemartyr

Oh and btw, those Antec cases ARE one ugly biatch aren't they? 😉
 
Oh... if you haven't installed the third exhaust fan, I wouldn't worry about it. If you want to add some more intake, consider a bay fan setup like this one. 120mm fans are generally pretty loud, anyway. (I know, as I have one.)
 
Don't worry if you don't have enough air flowing through with intake fans, just use the 2 fans in the back as exhaust and air with find it's way inside the case through the cracks and crannies.
 
You want the Airflow to be balanced if anything when cooling your case. You'll probably need 2 of your most powerful in the intake zone, then you want your not so good fans in the rear. You really don't want to have to much intake and not enough exhaust, that type of air flow can cause a weak bottleneck right around the agp and cpu. So if i was you i would just get 4 powerful fans altogether to be on the safe side. Possibly some high power sunons will do the trick.
 


<< Oh and btw, those Antec cases ARE one ugly biatch aren't they? >>

I certainly think so. Nice enough inside, but the front bezel is hideous...


WingnutPEZ: I find myself wondering if a 120mm fan has anything noise wise on my PSU fan? My PSU fan drives my roommate insane with it's noise, and it totally drowns out my two YS Tech 26CFM 60mms on my Alpha heatsink...heheheh I'm totally noise proof...the only thing that bothers me is very high pitched noise....but loud fans don't tend to bug me.


ReMeDy{WcS}: In-win.com has very little useful info on my case....I think Ars Technica did a review on the case though...I went to metacrawler and serached for Q500 and found lots of good reviews heheh 🙂 the front fan does have a little white plastic cage...but that could be fairly easily removed methinks.....I dunno if it has holes for a 12cm fan though...
 
I probably wouldn't use more than one fan for the chassis because multiple fans may actually decrease the air flow, even when they're working together. But the only way to find out is to try the fans in every possible combination of air flow and measure the inside/outside temperature difference each try.
 
i wouldn't install an intake in the rear and intake and frotn in the same general location so
they're blowing air at eachother - essentially defeating proper airflow, etc....

the 3 and 1 solution is best....3 and 2 would be better (i.e. adding another intake in the frotn middle)...the 2/2 solution is terrible....basically, i see it as a 1/2 (1 exhaust, 2 intake)...since i dont' consider the psu fan as contributing to the case's airflow circulation...it's merely pulling hot air out of the psu only...

and like someone suggested, the top one should exhaust since heat rises, the one behind the cpu should exhaust the cpu heat...i've had it intake and the temp. is hotter than when its exhaust...

pretty intuitive.
 
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